


fill the empty spaces

by soulofme



Category: GOT7
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, M/M, Post-Break Up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-19
Updated: 2019-08-19
Packaged: 2020-09-07 16:21:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,443
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20312440
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/soulofme/pseuds/soulofme
Summary: Jaebum is divorced, Mark is conflicted, and nothing makes sense now.





	fill the empty spaces

It’s summer when Mark shows his face in Busan again for the first time in five years. While everyone else his age is done with school and off doing their own things, he’s still drowning in his own sense of mediocrity. It’s a sad existence, really, but he’s got nothing to blame but his own indecisiveness.

Everything is hot and sunbaked when Mark gets out of the airport. Youngjae’s standing by the sliding doors with a little white sign. _Mark Tuan_, _Los Angeles_. As if there are a hundred Mark Tuan’s running around here.

He cracks a smile and steps forward. He’d packed light, meaning he only had one carryon and a pocket full of all the dying good memories of this place. He’s not usually this dramatic, but something about being back here pulls the worst from him.

“Hyung,” Youngjae greets him. He’s got his own smile on, that sweet little thing that Mark’s sure allows him to get away with murder. “You came.”

“I said I would,” Mark answers breezily, and if Youngjae picks up on his bitterness, he doesn’t mention it. That’s just not who Youngjae is.

They drive in silence, with the windows down and the wind ruffling their hair. Youngjae has his sunglasses on, but Mark can still feel the way he glances over at him every so often, as if he’s convinced Mark will suddenly launch himself out of a moving car.

It’s a tempting thought, for a moment, and Mark squashes it dead before he can really work through the logistics of it.

The beach house is warm and inviting when they arrive. Golden sand, tan walls, white trim. It looks like something out of a movie, a Hallmark film about family and love and everything good and great in this world.

When they’re inside, Youngjae lingers in the doorway, hands folded in front of him, and Mark just knows he’s barely holding himself back from saying something. He waits patiently, makes a big show out of kicking off his sneakers and shaking out his flattened hair. He smells stale, but it’s not like he’s got anyone to impress here.

“Mark!”

Jackson appears quite literally out of thin air and wraps an arm around Mark’s shoulders that honestly feels a little suffocating. He’s smiling wide but it’s not an act. He’s really that happy to see him.

There’s something comfortable and safe about Jackson. They’ve been through a lot, more than Mark cares to recount at the moment. But it’s enough that Jackson serves as a pillar of support for him, and he does the same for Jackson.

“How’ve you been? You haven’t called in a while.”

Jackson doesn’t mean anything by it, he’s sure, but it still makes him freeze up like he’s having his dirty laundry aired out. Maybe he is, with the way Youngjae looks at him like he’s dying to know why Mark kept his distance. But it’s not a secret. Hasn’t been, not since they graduated from high school and went off in seven different directions.

“I’ve been busy,” he lies anyway, because it’s easier and no one will ask him anything more about it.

“Gotcha,” Jackson says, nodding to himself. He slaps Mark on the back. “You must be exhausted, right? I’ll show you to your room.”

Mark almost protests that he doesn’t need help, that this house is still familiar to him, believe it or not, but then Jackson’s grabbing his hand and yanking him along. Youngjae gives him a smile that looks a little pitiful as he passes.

Jackson’s beaming as he pulls Mark along like his little puppet. Mark’s mourning the loss of his freedom when they round the corner and make their way down the hall, but then Jackson’s pushing open a door and everything feels almost okay again.

His room hasn’t been touched in years. Everything is exactly how he’d left it, when he’d been here back then. He wonders how the rest of them felt, when they’d come here to catch up and Mark never bothered to show his face or even call with an apology.

“It’s good to see you,” Jackson says, watching as Mark throws his bag down onto the ground and lays flat on the bed. He sounds so happy that Mark can’t even be an asshole about it. “I missed you. Everyone did.”

_Everyone_, Mark repeats to himself bitterly. An exaggeration, of course. There’s at least one person who Mark knows doesn’t care that he’s back, or even realized that he’d been gone at all.

Even so, Mark plays nice. Smiles, nods, pretends he totally gets what Jackson is saying. And if his smile is a little tense, and his nod a little jerky, and it’s glaringly obvious that he’s calling bullshit on that, Jackson doesn’t call him out on it. He should probably accept such a small mercy, right?

Jackson chirps something about catching up and then in the blink of an eye, they’re back in the car.

“Everyone else is already there,” Youngjae pipes up from the passenger seat, as Mark sits in the back and glares moodily at the ocean as they race past it.

Bambam and Yugyeom are sitting down when they enter the diner, some little joint that looks like it’s been around since the fifties, but they both shoot out of their seats and drag him into a bone-crushing hug. Their faces are pink and they’re loose-limbed and happy. They’re older, all of them are, but for some reason, looking at these two makes something twist sharply in Mark’s gut.

“Wow, you look the same,” Bambam says, right as Yugyeom says something about being so _happy_ that Mark’s here.

Mark snorts, dropping himself into the chair Youngjae pulls out for him. Jackson sits to his left and Youngjae to his right, and Mark wonders if they’re trying to act as some kind of human buffer between him and the rest of their group.

He counts the seats before he can stop himself. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven.

Seven seats for five people. It’s a strange thing, but Mark doesn’t mention it. No one does, actually, and when the perky waitress with a blinding smiling arrives at their table, Mark orders a beer. Her smile falters just so at the scowl on his face, at the way he barks out his order, but he’s tired. Guilty now, too, when he realizes she’s just another innocent caught in his warpath. But he doesn’t get to ruminate on that for long, because everyone’s looking at him with thinly-veiled interest.

“What?” he bites out, tearing off a chunk of their complimentary bread with his teeth.

“We didn’t know if you’d come,” Yugyeom says delicately, playing with the edges of a napkin, not quite looking him in the eye. “You never answered when we called, so.”

He thinks, briefly, of the messages that had clogged up his answering machine. He’d thought about calling back, once or twice, but then he’d get caught up in his own head and decided radio silence was the better option. They all said the same thing. _Come back home, we miss you, everyone wants to see you_.

No amount of begging was supposed to get him back to Busan, or hell, to _Korea_. It’s a miracle he’s here at all.

Mark’s beer arrives then, dripping condensation down the waitress’s hand. He grabs it before she can even place it on the table. Pops the cap on the edge of the table, takes a sip, and lets it sit in his mouth before he swallows it down. It burns the entire way down and he relishes the pain like he’s some sick fuck.

“I was busy,” Mark grits out, and Yugyeom shrinks down into his chair.

“Jaebum-hyung asked about you,” Bambam says, and there’s something fierce in his eyes. If they weren’t in public, maybe he’d try to wring Mark’s neck.

“I was _busy_,” he says again, with more bite, but Bambam doesn’t back down. He doesn’t know _how_ to.

“You should see him.”

“For what?”

They’re at a standoff then, and Yugyeom, Youngjae, and Jackson are caught tragically in the middle. Youngjae looks uncomfortable, still not used to diffusing conflict even though he’s had years of practice. Jackson has his head in his hands, probably thinking about what a disaster this little get-together is becoming. Yugyeom still looks like an admonished child, nervously biting his lower lip.

He bets the three of them regret bringing Mark around, and it makes him feel victorious in a nasty kind of way. He takes another swig of beer and smirks at Bambam. He’s furious, lips pulled down into a frown, tapping his fingers on the tabletop in an agitated rhythm.

“You don’t even know what’s going on with him,” Bambam says.

Mark shrugs. “Jaebum’s a big boy.”

The reminder that he and Jaebum are so impossibly far apart now stings, but he won’t show it. Not willingly.

“Bam, maybe you should—”

“You’re a dick.”

He expects Bambam to storm off, for Yugyeom or Youngjae or even Jackson to run after him, while whoever is left behind will give him a pointed look and urge him to fix this. But that doesn’t happen, because they’re all grown ups now. Everyone but Mark, maybe, who’s still stuck feeling like he’s fucking eighteen all over again.

He polishes his beer off and orders another. Bambam is seething while Yugyeom tends to his emotional wounds. Youngjae and Jackson are suspiciously quiet.

“Jaebum-hyung got divorced.” Youngjae’s voice breaks everyone out of their anger-fueled stupors. Especially Yugyeom, whose eyes get all big and wide.

“Hyung!” he hisses, and Bambam snorts, crossing his arms over his chest.

“He would’ve heard about it eventually,” Jackson says then. He turns to Mark with this great big sigh, even though Mark’s silently begging him to _shut the hell up_. “Six months ago. It was hard on him. He wanted to talk to you, but…well, we tried to help. But we don’t know him like you do.”

“Did,” Mark corrects, and ignores how Bambam rolls his eyes at him. “I don’t know him now.”

“But you did,” Jackson insists, gripping Mark by his biceps like that’ll make him see reason. “At one point, you _did_.”

“What the hell do you want me to do, Jackson?” Mark growls, slapping Jackson’s hands away. There’s a fire burning inside him with no way of putting it out.

“He always looked out for you,” Jackson mumbles, sounding crushed. “You said you’d never give up on him.”

“Things were different when I said that.”

“No, not really.”

“What the fuck do _you_ know?”

Jackson rears back like he’s been struck. Mark grinds his teeth and watches as everything around them stills. He drops back in his seat and swallows down the sour taste in his mouth that’s got nothing to do with the beer he’s drowning himself in.

Yugyeom’s looking at him like he’s going to break, like one little touch will shatter him and send all of his pieces crashing against the floor. Bambam looks at him like he’s nothing more than the dirt beneath his shoe, which is funny, considering how he always expected Bambam would take his side if things went to shit. Youngjae has one hand reached out for him, like he’s ready to catch Mark if he falls.

There’s nothing left for him now. He’s said his piece, pissed off everyone who gives a shit about him. It’s time to go. A familiar routine, he thinks. He’s running like he really is eighteen again.

A slaps a handful of bills on the table, probably enough to cover the two beers and much more. No one stops him when he gets up. The chair screeches horribly against the tiled floor and it feels like everyone is staring at him. Mark shoves his chair in like an irate child and bites back the scream building up in his throat. He wants to rip his hair out, throwing a fucking tantrum right here, right now.

He doesn’t. Because Mark is all grown up now. Capable of handling his emotions in a way that doesn’t hurt those around him. He’s never really learned how to do that, how to talk about things instead of bottling them up until he explodes. But maybe now’s as good as a time as ever to figure it out.

It’s fun to pretend he’s not as fucked as he feels, that everything that piled up and culminated in this point made him stronger, not weaker.

When he steps outside of the diner, into the hot Busan afternoon, he can’t breathe. The sun’s shining right in his eyes, making sweat bead along his hairline, the back of his neck. He swallows and it feels like he’s got a rock in his throat, all sharp and jagged edges.

Mark leans against the rough brick of the building, tilts his head up towards the sky and squeezes his eyes shut. His face is warm, uncomfortably so, but he focuses on counting his breaths so he doesn’t think about it. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven.

It’s a bad idea.

Because now he’s thinking of one, two, three, four, five, six, seven _chairs_, for one, two, three, four, five _people_. He wouldn’t be surprised, really, if Jaebum had originally planned to come, to get together with the gang, and then backed out once he heard Mark was coming. If the tables were turned, if he was half the person Jaebum is, maybe Mark would’ve done the same.

He hadn’t expected Jinyoung to show up. He hates Mark now, for the way he dragged his best friend down, for the way he didn’t say what he needed to when he should’ve. It’s admirable, how he’s able to stick to Jaebum’s side like glue, hold the bits of him Mark left behind up. Jaebum’s never been particularly easy to deal with.

He takes a cab back to the house, and it’s loud where he expects silence. There’s someone watching television, and Mark stands in the doorway until Jinyoung pauses his drama and turns to look at him. He stares at him until Mark shifts uncomfortably, frowning like he’s displeased about whatever it is he finds.

“You’re back early.”

Mark kicks his shoes off and pads into the living room. Sits down across from Jinyoung and crosses his arms over his chest.

“You weren’t there. I almost missed you.”

“Too many people. I wanted to see you like this first,” Jinyoung says. “You look good.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“Maybe.”

Mark eyes the suitcases piled up behind the couch.

“He’s not here yet.” Jinyoung sounds smug when he says it.

“Yet?” Mark asks.

“He wants to see his friends,” Jinyoung explains easily, shrugging. “You just happen to be here.”

Mark clenches his jaw. Doesn’t point out that at one point in time, he’d been one of those _friends_.

Jinyoung stares at him in a way that makes Mark feel like he’s looking through him rather than at him. He tries not to wiggle uncomfortably in his chair, but then he does, and the corners of Jinyoung’s infuriatingly perfect mouth raise up into a smirk.

“You’ve changed, Mark-hyung.”

Mark scoffs. “I’m the same, Jinyoungie.”

“The same, but different,” Jinyoung muses. He rests his cheek on his fist and raises his eyebrows at Mark. “Ever since the wedding.”

“What are you talking about?”

“C’mon,” Jinyoung says, an exasperated edge to his voice, one that everyone tends to get after prolonged interaction with him.

“No. I don’t want to hear it,” Mark answers firmly. _Especially not from you_ he doesn’t add.

He gets up, feels Jinyoung watching him as he storms out of the room. His room feels suffocating even though he’s the only one in it, but he needs to get away. He shoves his head beneath one of the large pillows and clamps it down around him. It blocks out everything, Jinyoung’s drama, whatever everyone said to him today, and hell, even his own goddamn breaths.

Mark’s staring down two identical packages of ramen, wondering why the hell it even matters to him. Everything ends up the same once you swallow it, right? He knows Youngjae will probably force him to eat something substantial when he gets back, and Jinyoung will probably sit across the counter and sip at his coffee like he’s the rich male antagonist of a romance drama.

When Youngjae called and told him to come to Busan, Mark had thought it would be a quick trip. He’d be there for a week, maybe less, depending on how sick of him the others get. And then he’d run back to America and ignore them until the next one of them decided to call. But it’s been a week, a little bit more, actually. The idea that Mark is somehow supposed to become comfortable here, settle back down like he’s here for the long-haul, makes his skin itch.

He snatches off the cheaper ramen off the shelf and drops it into the cart with far less care than he should. He’s about to turn, about to push the cart forward and go on his own merry way, when he sees _him_.

Im Jaebum, freshly-divorced and looking so frustratingly good that Mark feels a little queasy the longer he looks at him. His hair’s dark again. It’d been firetruck red the last time Mark saw him, and for a second, he finds himself thinking about how it fit him. Jaebum used to kiss him with all the passion he reserved for things he gave a fuck about, like music and life and the people in it. Red seemed to embody that.

Jaebum’s lost in his own little world, grabbing a bag of rice and setting it down into his cart like it’s a swaddled-up baby. It makes Mark sneer, for one horrible second, and the realization that he still cares about Jaebum feels like a sucker punch to the teeth.

In the back of his mind, he sees Im Jaebum’s wedding. There’s white, with pink flowers and delicate candles. His bride looks like a princess, with her big, fluffy gown and pretty pale skin. Jinah was her name.

He doesn’t know why he bothered to remember that. She was a small little thin, petite and so overwhelmingly feminine. It was the complete opposite of what Mark was, and maybe that was what he hated so much about her.

She was the one everyone was supposed to coo over and congratulate. It was her big day, after all. She got the man of her dreams and they were going to go live the rest of their lives together.

But Mark never talked to her, because he’d booked it before he even gave his best man speech. The others haven’t brought that bit up to him yet, the way he’d slipped out before anyone could even notice he was gone. But it’s probably because Mark tries not to talk, or think, about Jaebum.

Busan is only so big, after all. He should’ve seen this coming.

He’s an adult, he reminds himself. So he keeps his head up and pushes his cart forward, eyes focused on the end of the aisle like he’s completely concerned with inspecting whatever is waiting for him there.

He doesn’t get very far. Because when he looks up to check his progress, to see how far away from Jaebum he is, their eyes meet.

Jaebum’s not smiling, but Mark never thought he would, if they ever met again. His chest feels tight like he’s being suffocated, and it gets worse with the way Jaebum just _stands_ there.

“You’re back.”

The words feel like they weigh so much more than they should. Mark grips the handlebar of his cart hard.

“It’s only temporary,” Mark answers, even though he’s becoming less and less sure about that.

“I just got in, actually,” Jaebum says, even though Mark hasn’t asked.

“Jinyoung said you’d be here.”

Mark wants to run. Just keep going and goin until he can forget this day, and all of the days that led up to it.

“Have you seen the others yet?”

“Does it matter?” Mark bites out before he can stop himself. Jaebum doesn’t flinch like Youngjae or Yugyeom would, or frown like Jinyoung and Jackson, or even glare like Bambam.

His expression is blank, even if his eyebrows do furrow for a second before they even out. Because Jaebum knows how prickly Mark can get, and he’s always matched his anger with his own, time and time again.

“Why are you even here?”

“Youngjae called me.”

“Youngjae’s been calling you for months.”

There’s the silent question of _what changed_ hanging between them.

“…He said you and Jinah were having problems.”

“Problems.”

“You got divorced?”

Jaebum sucks in a breath. “What, you’re gonna say _I told you so_?”

“No,” Mark mutters with a frown. “I was gonna say sorry.”

“You’re not sorry,” Jaebum snaps, sounding so sure of himself. He clenches his jaw and shakes his head.

They’re having a stare off, right there in the middle of the grocery store. Mark rolls his eyes.

“I’m going.”

“No.”

Jaebum’s narrowing his eyes at him.

“What do you mean _no_?”

“I mean, you don’t get to run away right now.”

Not again. He doesn’t hear it, but Mark senses it. He knows Jaebum’s thinking it. And maybe deep down, it stings a bit. More than he’d like to admit.

“You’re not busy, right?” Jaebum says, jerking his chin towards Mark’s mostly-empty cart. “Come with me.”

“And why the hell would I do that?”

“Because you owe me,” Jaebum sounds so confident, like he’s been thinking of these exact words for the past five years. “Because _you’re_ the reason everything got fucked up.”

“Don’t you dare blame your shitty marriage on me!”

“Just,” Jaebum begins, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Stop throwing a fit for one second, okay? Just…humor me.”

The urge to say no feels reflexive, but Mark doesn’t say it. He abandons his cart of ramen and follows after Jaebum, who buys his rice and vegetables like this is just another Tuesday afternoon.

Jaebum’s got himself a black Range Rover, all shiny and unscratched. Mark rolls his eyes at it but gets into the passenger seat. He tries not to look surprised when he realizes Jaebum’s not driving them to the beach house.

“You’re not staying with everyone?”

“Seemed like a bad idea,” Jaebum says vaguely. Mark snorts.

“It’s your place too,” he says, leaning his head back against his seat. “It belongs to all of us.”

Jaebum doesn’t respond and Mark lets it go. The silence is painful, and he doesn’t know how much longer of this he can take.

The hotel Jaebum pulls up in front of has a homey feel to it. It contrasts sharply with his fancy little car and spit-shined shoes. He looks like he’s just walked off the cover of GQ, and there’s something so inherently unfair about that.

Jaebum’s hotel room is tiny. Blue and white, with a bed that creaks when he sits down onto it. It’s everything Jaebum’s not and Mark wants to laugh at it.

“Jinah was the one who divorced me.”

“How badly did you fuck up?” Mark asks, meant to be more of a jab than anything, but Jaebum scowls. “What?”

“She accused me of still being in love with you.”

“What?” Mark hisses again, shaking his head.

“You left,” Jaebum says. “Before the wedding even started, you were gone.”

“Why are you surprised?” Mark mumbles, crossing his arms and resting against the desk pushed against the wall, right across from Jaebum. “You knew how I felt.”

“I know. And I still went through with it.”

“What do you want me to say?” Mark groans. “You got what you want, Jaebum.”

“No, I didn’t,” Jaebum says, frustrated. “You think you know everything, but you don’t know a damn thing.”

“Then enlighten me.”

Jaebum sucks in a heavy breath and sags back against the bed. Mark stares at the sharp edge of his jaw and tries to ignore the rush of want that surges up inside of him, even now.

“It was easy, being with Jinah.”

“Because no one cared,” Mark mumbles. “You weren’t doing anything _wrong_.”

“But I wasn’t doing something right either!”

“God, what the hell does that even mean?” Mark growls. “You had it all, Jaebum. You had a perfect wife and a perfect life and now… what the fuck did you throw all of that away for?”

“You.”

Mark’s jaw drops before he can stop himself. He feels like a fish out of water, mouth gaping open as he wriggles about desperately on shore. He can’t breathe, or think, or even speak.

“You’re the one who broke up with me.”

It’s a quiet reminder, and it sucks to say, but clearly, Jaebum’s forgotten that little fact. His expression crumbles and Mark doesn’t let himself think for one second that he’s going to _cry_.

“I know.”

“Then what is this?”

“You know how I am,” Jaebum says, injecting his voice with this false cheery tone that grates on every last one of Mark’s nerves. “Always figuring out shit when it’s too late.”

“Oh, god.”

This isn’t happening. He’s not in Busan with his ex-boyfriend, listening to him talk about how he married someone because he thought it was what he should do, not what he wanted to. He’s not listening to Jaebum telling him that somewhere deep down, he still loves Mark.

Because that’s not _possible_.

And yet, here they are.

“I don’t want anything from you,” Jaebum says, speaking quickly like he’s afraid Mark’s going to cut him off. “I just wanna be your friend.”

“Friend.”

“I was, once,” Jaebum says. “Right?”

“That was a long time ago,” Mark says, pushing himself off of the desk. He doesn’t know where he’s going, just that he can’t stay here for another second.

“But it still happened,” Jaebum insists, jumping to his feet, pinning Mark with this look that’s way too fucking open. “Mark. Do I even have a chance with you?”

Mark grinds his teeth together, debating. What are the right words for his situation? What does he even feel? It’s all a bunch of muddled thoughts that hurt his head.

“I don’t know,” Mark says, but before Jaebum can speak he’s making a run for it. Grabbing the doorknob and launching himself into the hallway like he can’t wait to get out of there.

He wishes the door clicking shut behind him sounded as final as he wanted it to.


End file.
